Olive Oil Zucchini Bread: The Recipe and Why Oil Beats Butter Here
Olive oil zucchini bread is the quick bread to make when the courgettes (zucchini) are arriving faster than you can eat them. You grate one or two straight into the bowl, pour in the oil instead of melting or creaming butter, and get a soft, lightly spiced loaf flecked with green that stays moist for days. Below is our own olive oil zucchini bread recipe, written from scratch for this article with metric and US measures side by side, followed by the two questions most recipes skip or disagree on: whether to squeeze the zucchini, and why oil, not butter, is the right fat for a batter that is already full of water. We also cover which olive oil to use, a muffin version, and how to store and freeze it.
For our own oil, see our Cold-Pressed Single-Estate Extra Virgin Olive Oil - Marrakech (500ml).
The Short Answer
- Our recipe uses 300g (about 2½ cups) coarsely grated zucchini, 120ml (½ cup) extra virgin olive oil, 2 eggs, brown sugar, lemon zest, cinnamon and 250g (2 cups) plain flour in a 900g (2lb) loaf tin, baked at 180°C / 160°C fan / 350°F for 55–65 minutes.
- Squeeze the zucchini lightly, not dry: press out about 50ml (3–4 tablespoons) of liquid. Raw zucchini is about 95% water by weight in USDA nutrient data, so a little goes, but most of that moisture is what keeps the loaf soft.
- Oil beats butter here because olive oil is 100% fat and stays liquid at room temperature, while butter is at least 80% milkfat with the rest mostly water, and firms up again as the loaf cools.
- A mild or medium-fruity extra virgin olive oil suits zucchini and lemon; very peppery oils are better kept for chocolate or walnut versions.
- The loaf is done when a skewer comes out clean and the centre reads about 93°C (200°F), the doneness temperature ThermoWorks gives for zucchini bread.
- The recipe is dairy-free as written and needs one bowl and no mixer; the same batter makes 12 muffins in about 20–24 minutes.
- Sidr & Stone's olive oil is a single-estate, cold-pressed, unfiltered extra virgin olive oil from our own farm on the plains outside Marrakech, Morocco, sold in 500ml dark glass.
Olive Oil Zucchini Bread Recipe: Ingredients (Metric and US)
This makes one 900g (2lb) loaf, roughly 23 × 13cm (9 × 5in), about 10 slices. Weigh the zucchini and flour if you can: grated zucchini packs very differently from cook to cook, and cup measures of flour vary. If you use cups for flour, spoon it in and level it rather than scooping.
| Ingredient | Metric | US |
|---|---|---|
| Zucchini (courgette), coarsely grated, skin on | 300g (about 2 medium) | about 2½ cups, loosely packed |
| Extra virgin olive oil | 120ml | ½ cup |
| Light brown sugar (soft light brown) | 150g | ⅔ cup, packed |
| Granulated (caster) sugar | 50g | ¼ cup |
| Large eggs, room temperature | 2 | 2 |
| Finely grated zest of 1 unwaxed lemon | 1 lemon | 1 lemon |
| Ground cinnamon | 1½ tsp | 1½ tsp |
| Ground nutmeg | ¼ tsp | ¼ tsp |
| Plain (all-purpose) flour | 250g | 2 cups |
| Baking powder | 1½ tsp | 1½ tsp |
| Bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) | ½ tsp | ½ tsp |
| Fine salt | ½ tsp | ½ tsp |
| Optional: chopped walnuts | 75g | ⅔ cup |
Tin and oven: one 900g (2lb) loaf tin, brushed with a little olive oil and lined with a strip of baking paper that overhangs the long sides. Oven at 180°C conventional, 160°C fan, 350°F, or gas mark 4, shelf just below the middle.
We keep the recipe alcohol-free: lemon zest and cinnamon do the job vanilla extract usually does. If you like vanilla, about ½ tsp of an alcohol-free vanilla powder or paste works.
Method: How to Make Olive Oil Zucchini Bread, Step by Step
- Prepare. Heat the oven and line the tin. Trim the ends of the zucchini but leave the skin on; it gives the green flecks and softens completely in the bake.
- Grate and squeeze lightly. Grate the zucchini on the coarse side of a box grater. Pile it into a clean tea towel or a sieve over a bowl and press until about 50ml (3–4 tablespoons) of liquid has run out. Stop there; it should still look damp.
- Whisk the wet ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk the olive oil, both sugars, eggs and lemon zest for about a minute, until thick, glossy and evenly blended with no streaks of oil.
- Add the zucchini. Stir the squeezed zucchini into the wet mixture.
- Add the dry ingredients. Sift in the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt, or whisk them together separately first. Fold with a spatula just until no dry flour is visible, then fold in the walnuts if using. Overmixing makes a tough, tunnelled loaf.
- Bake. Scrape the batter into the tin and level it. Bake for 55–65 minutes. If the top is browning fast at around 40 minutes, lay a sheet of foil loosely over it.
- Test. It is done when a skewer pushed into the centre comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs, the top springs back, and a probe thermometer reads about 93°C (200°F).
- Cool. Leave in the tin for 15 minutes, then lift out by the paper and cool on a rack. Slice once fully cool; an oil-based loaf finishes setting as it cools.
The 93°C (200°F) figure comes from ThermoWorks' guide to zucchini bread, which recommends pulling quick breads, zucchini included, at 200°F because a dense, moist crumb can fool a skewer. If you would rather convert your own butter-based zucchini bread, our guide to baking with olive oil sets out the swap.
Should You Squeeze the Zucchini for Zucchini Bread?
Squeeze it lightly. Raw zucchini is about 95% water: USDA nutrient data lists 94.8g of water per 100g, so 300g of grated zucchini carries roughly 285g of water into the batter. Pressing out 50ml stops the loaf turning gummy, while the water left behind steams through the crumb and keeps it soft.
Published recipes genuinely disagree on this. Some, like Food52's olive oil zucchini bread, tell you to wring the zucchini out hard in a towel for a lighter texture; others, like Kitchen Treaty's, never drain it at all. Both work, because each recipe balances its flour to its own amount of liquid. The problem comes from mixing methods: following a no-squeeze recipe with zucchini wrung bone-dry gives a drier, crumblier loaf, and adding unsqueezed zucchini to a recipe written for squeezed gives a dense, wet band through the middle.
Our recipe is balanced for lightly squeezed zucchini. Two practical adjustments:
- Late-summer, oversized zucchini are watery and seedy. Scoop out the soft seed core before grating and squeeze a little more firmly.
- Frozen grated zucchini releases a lot of liquid as it thaws. Thaw it in a sieve, then squeeze to the same damp, not dry, stage.
Why Olive Oil Beats Butter in Zucchini Bread
The difference starts with what each fat is. US federal grading standards require butter to contain at least 80% milkfat, with the rest mostly water and milk solids. Olive oil is 100% fat and stays liquid at room temperature. Butter does not: once a butter loaf cools, the fat in the crumb firms up again, which is why butter quick breads feel firmer and drier by day two.
In zucchini bread that matters more than usual. The batter already carries plenty of water from the vegetable, so there is no need for the extra water in butter, and there is nothing for creamed butter to do: like banana bread, zucchini bread rises on baking powder and bicarbonate of soda, not on air beaten into butter. Liquid oil also coats the flour as you stir, limiting gluten development, which keeps the crumb tender rather than bready. And the whole batter comes together in one bowl in about ten minutes.
| Fat | What it is | Effect in zucchini bread |
|---|---|---|
| Extra virgin olive oil | 100% fat, liquid at room temperature, keeps the flavour of the olives | Soft, moist crumb that stays soft; a faint green, fruity note that suits zucchini and lemon |
| Neutral oil (sunflower, rapeseed/canola) or refined "light" olive oil | 100% fat, liquid, little or no flavour | Same soft texture, no olive character |
| Melted butter | At least 80% milkfat, the rest mostly water and milk solids; solid at room temperature | Dairy richness, but firms as it cools and dries out sooner |
There is one honest trade-off. Butter brings a dairy flavour some people miss, and a creamed-butter loaf can be a little taller and more cake-like. If that is what you want, you want a zucchini cake rather than this bread. For a fuller comparison of the two fats in and out of the oven, see our article on olive oil vs butter.
Which Olive Oil Is Best for Zucchini Bread?
Zucchini itself tastes of very little once baked, so the oil, lemon and spice carry the flavour. Extra virgin olive oil is the only grade that keeps the taste of the olives: it is mechanically pressed and never refined. A mild or medium-fruity extra virgin oil gives a rounded, slightly grassy richness that sits naturally with zucchini and lemon zest. "Light" olive oil is refined oil sold on its mildness, not on fewer calories, as our article on what "light" olive oil really means explains.
The objection: "Won't extra virgin make it taste like olives?"
Some recipe writers recommend plain or light olive oil for exactly this reason, and it is a fair choice if you want a neutral loaf. In practice, a mild or medium-fruity extra virgin oil reads as richness more than olive once cinnamon, sugar and lemon are in. A very bitter, pungent oil will come through, so keep those for a chocolate or walnut version, or use half and half with a milder oil. Our explainer on what "fruity" means on an olive oil label helps decode tasting notes.
The objection: "Isn't it a waste of good oil?"
The quantity is modest, 120ml, under a quarter of a 500ml bottle, and in a loaf this gently flavoured a fresh oil is noticeable in a way a refined one is not. The oil genuinely not worth baking with is a stale one: rancid olive oil smells of crayons, putty or old nuts, and the oven concentrates it. Our guide to telling whether olive oil has gone off walks through the checks, and our guide to choosing a quality olive oil covers what to look for on the bottle: the grade, a harvest or best-before date, dark glass or a tin, and a named origin.
Olive Oil Zucchini Muffins and Other Variations
The base batter adapts easily. These are starting points, so check a few minutes early.
- Olive oil zucchini muffins: divide the batter between 12 lined muffin cups and bake at 190°C / 170°C fan / 375°F for about 20–24 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.
- Walnut: fold in 75g (⅔ cup) chopped walnuts, toasted for 6–8 minutes first for deeper flavour, and scatter a few over the top.
- Chocolate zucchini bread: replace 30g (¼ cup) of the flour with cocoa powder and fold in 100g (generous ½ cup) dark chocolate chips. A more robust olive oil works well here.
- Lemon glaze: once cool, drizzle over 100g (¾ cup) icing (powdered) sugar mixed with 1½–2 tbsp lemon juice.
- Wholemeal: swap up to half the plain flour for wholemeal (whole wheat) flour and expect a slightly denser loaf.
- Gluten-free: use a gluten-free plain flour blend with xanthan gum included (or ¼ tsp added) and expect a slightly longer bake.
If you bake with olive oil often, our olive oil banana bread, citrus olive oil cake and chocolate olive oil cake use the same one-bowl method.
Storing, Freezing and Serving Olive Oil Zucchini Bread
Because the loaf holds more water than most cakes, keep it wrapped or in an airtight tin at cool room temperature and eat it within two to three days; in a warm kitchen, move it to the fridge after the first day. It freezes well: wrap slices individually or separate them with baking paper, freeze, and toast or thaw them as needed.
Serve it plain, toasted, or with a thin drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and a pinch of flaky salt. On health, the honest framing is simple: this is still a sweet loaf with sugar and flour, and the zucchini does not make it a vegetable serving in any meaningful sense. Using extra virgin olive oil means the fat is mostly monounsaturated oleic acid rather than the largely saturated fat of butter, a reasonable swap within a balanced diet. For the research on olive oil's own compounds, see our article on olive oil polyphenols.
Why Sidr & Stone
In a quick bread where zucchini contributes texture and the oil contributes much of the flavour, the oil is the part of this recipe we can speak for. Sidr & Stone's extra virgin olive oil comes from one place, our own farm on the plains outside Marrakech, and we control every step from tree to bottle.
- Single-estate: Sidr & Stone's olive oil comes from our own family-owned farm near Marrakech, Morocco, with no blending across origins.
- Rain-fed: the trees are not irrigated; they take what the season gives.
- Organically grown: no synthetic fertilisers, pesticides or herbicides are used (not yet certified; certification is in progress).
- Single harvest: each batch is small and limited, picked when the fruit is ready; once it is gone, it is gone until the next harvest.
- Cold-pressed within hours of harvest: to protect flavour, aroma and polyphenols.
- Unfiltered extra virgin: minimally processed, so a little natural sediment at the bottom of the bottle is normal.
- 100% natural: a single ingredient, olive oil, with nothing added.
- Dark glass with a gold label: 500ml bottles that protect the oil from light.
- 10% of profits to charity: a Sidr & Stone commitment across every product.
- Fulfilment in the UK, EU and US.
We will not tell you ours is the best olive oil for zucchini bread; your own kitchen is the judge of that. What we will say is that it is single-estate Moroccan, rain-fed, organically grown and cold-pressed within hours of harvest, and that a fresh oil with a clear origin is exactly what a simple loaf like this rewards.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can you use olive oil in zucchini bread?
Yes. Zucchini bread is raised with baking powder and bicarbonate of soda rather than creamed butter, so a liquid oil is a natural fit. Use about 120ml (½ cup) of olive oil for a standard 900g (2lb) loaf, as in the recipe above.
Is oil or butter better for zucchini bread?
Oil, for most people. Olive oil is 100% fat and stays liquid when the loaf cools, so the crumb stays soft for days; butter is at least 80% fat, adds more water to an already wet batter and firms up as it cools.
Should I squeeze the zucchini before baking?
Lightly. Press out about 50ml (3–4 tablespoons) of liquid from 300g of grated zucchini and leave it damp. Wringing it bone-dry makes a crumbly loaf; not squeezing at all can leave a dense, wet band in the middle.
Do you peel zucchini for zucchini bread?
No. The skin softens completely in the oven and gives the loaf its green flecks. Just trim the ends and wash it; for very large zucchini, scoop out the soft seed core.
Is Sidr & Stone's olive oil good for zucchini bread?
Yes. It is a single-estate, cold-pressed, unfiltered extra virgin olive oil, so it adds real flavour to an oil-based loaf like this. As with any extra virgin oil, it is at its best in bakes where the oil is meant to be tasted.
Can I make olive oil zucchini muffins with this recipe?
Yes. Divide the batter between 12 lined muffin cups and bake at 190°C / 170°C fan / 375°F for about 20–24 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean.
Where can I buy single-estate extra virgin olive oil?
Our Cold-Pressed Single-Estate Extra Virgin Olive Oil - Marrakech (500ml) is available directly from the Sidr & Stone website, with fulfilment in the UK, EU and US.
Is olive oil a medicine?
No. Olive oil is a food, not a medicine. It has a long traditional history — including being honoured in the Prophetic Sunnah — and a substantial body of modern research, particularly around polyphenols, cardiovascular health, and the Mediterranean diet pattern. It can be a worthwhile part of a healthy routine, but it does not cure diseases and is not a substitute for medical care. Be cautious of any olive oil marketed with specific disease-cure claims.
Final Thoughts
Olive oil zucchini bread is a good example of a recipe where the oil is not a substitute but the better choice. The batter is already wet with zucchini, there is no creaming to do, and a liquid fat keeps the crumb soft long after a butter loaf would have firmed. The two things that decide how good yours is are how you handle the zucchini, squeezed lightly rather than wrung dry, and the freshness of the oil: a mild or medium-fruity extra virgin olive oil you would happily eat on bread.
If you want an oil with a clear origin for this and every other bake, our Cold-Pressed Single-Estate Extra Virgin Olive Oil - Marrakech (500ml), single-estate, rain-fed and cold-pressed within hours of harvest, is available to pre-order now, with fulfilment in the UK, EU and US.
Our extra virgin olive oil is grown organically on our own single-estate farm on the plains outside Marrakech: we control every step from tree to bottle, and no synthetic pesticides, herbicides or fertilisers are used. It is not yet certified organic — certification is in progress, and we will publish it as soon as it comes through.
Disclaimer: This article shares a home-baking recipe and general cooking information at the time of writing, with nutrient and doneness figures drawn from USDA nutrient data, the USDA butter grading standard and ThermoWorks; ovens, ingredients and individual dietary needs vary, and the recipe contains eggs and wheat (and nuts if you add them). References to other publishers imply no affiliation or endorsement. Olive oil is a food, not a medicine, and is not a substitute for medical treatment of any condition. For any health concern, consult a qualified medical professional.